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Pelvic floor muscles are the ones that stretch between the pubic bone and tailbone and you can clench them to stop the flow of pee.

Keeping them strong is important for a variety of reasons, including providing stability for the pelvic reason and lower spine. This is particularly important for women as pregnancy and childbirth can wreak havoc on the PFMs and this can then lead to incontinence (both kinds) and reduced pleasure during sex. That's where Skea (which stands for Smart Kegel Exercise Aid) and KGoal come in.

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Skea

Skea is fundamentally the same as KGoal in that it involves a small sensor-packed device that is inserted into the vagina that connects to an app. The wearer has to clench the device with their PFMs and the power with which they do so is registered on the app.

Biofeedback is provided through vibration motors in the device.

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Skea differentiates itself from KGoal in one key way: gamification.

You get to play a little video game on your smartphone as you squeeze your muscles.

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The Skea game prototype is called Alice in Continent.

Alice needs to jump around to dodge obstacles and collect points.

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In order to control the on-screen avatar you don't touch the screen -- instead you have to simply clench. It's been described by one tester as "like playing Temple Run with Fitbit. Just that I don't use fingers but use my pelvic muscles!".

As Tom (Qingyue) Chen, founder and chief game designer of Linkcube Studio, which makes Skea, told Wired.co.uk that the gaming element is important because, according to studies, 80 percent of women fail to complete Kegel training due to lack of interest.

Getting the balance between making a useful training tool and a fun game has been the biggest challenge. "The goal is to let users enjoy the virtual game and at the same time perform the 'chores' in reality. The balance is tricky: too much focus on the game lowers the exercise efficiency; but too much focus on the exercise breaks the 'flow state' of the game world," explains Chen. "To be honest, we have not completely overcome the problem," he adds, pointing out that they have had to compromise. "We are still heavily debating on whether we should allow other control mechanisms (such as tilting the phone) or simply limit the control input to pelvic contractions only. By the end of the year we should deliver a very balanced experience."

Skea is currently raising funds on Kickstarter. The team is also looking for feedback about game suggestions -- it's not limited to Alice In Continent. "We are also considering a Tiny Wings-style game where the player exerts a simple binary control (i.e. either you touch the screen or not. It is the timing that matters).

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Another potential candidate is Flappy Bird-style, but of course we would lower the difficulty. There was even a wild suggestion to combine Oculus Rift together to deliver an immersive AR game," explains Chen. The team is also considering introducing social features so you could compare scores with your friends. If you pledge more than $500 to Skea, the team will create a personalised avatar for the game -- you'll have to send them photos and they'll build a 3D model and put you in the game. You can donate to the project here. If it gets funded, the product should ship in time for December 2014.

Linkcube is a "wearable electronics" studio based in Beijing, that seems to only make vibrators and now Skea.